Board of Supervisors — 2020-12-15

Thank you for preparing.

I'll call to order the December 15, 2020 meeting of the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors. Will the clerk please call the roll?

Ms. Hartman? Here! Mr. Adams?

Here.

Mr. Lavinino?

Here.

Mr Williams? Here and Chair Hart?

Next item of business is approval of minutes from the December 8, 2020 meeting. Is there any discussion? Is there a motion to approve the minutes?

Move approval.

Second. Thank you. Any discussion to the motion? Madam Clerk, could you please call the roll?

Ms. Hartman? Aye. Mr. Adams?

Aye.

Mr Lavinino? Aye Mr Williams? Aye Chair Hart? Aye Motion passes unanimously.

CEO Miyasato, is there a CEO report today?

No report this morning chair.

And Madam Clerk, are there any announcements or changes to our agenda today?

Chair Hart and members of the board. Yes I have a couple announcements this morning. I would like to begin that we posted an addendum to the agenda on Friday amending departmental item number four from planning and development recommendation B To remove September 3rd, 2020 and October 21st, 2020 respectively to December 1st, 2020. So it should read certify the environmental impact report EIR as modified by EIR revision letter dated December 1st 2020.

In addition, we posted a withdrawal memo yesterday withdrawing department item number four. This is from Planning and Development. It is a hearing to consider recommendations regarding the Oasis Meeting Center project case numbers 14 GPA 20 16 RMM 1 16 CUP 6 16 DVP 2 16 LLA 4 17 CUP 13 In addition to that on our addendum, we added administrative item number 40 from General Services. It is to consider recommendations regarding temporary authorization for the general services director to execute COVID-19 related real estate transactions.

And we added Administrative Item A-41 from Community Services. It is to consider recommendations regarding the execution of a grant agreement with the Housing Authority of the City of Santa Barbara for acquisition of the property located at 536 West Pedragosa Street in the city of Santa Barbara. This is in the first district and there's a four-fifths vote required on this item. In addition, I did receive a notice from County Council To read the following language.

Into the record this morning administrative item 41 is from community services. There's a 4th vote required on this item we have a slight revision to recommendation D to remove the phrase capital assets. And I believe that is all my announcements this morning.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Mr. Chair, I'd like to pull A2 as well.

A2 okay. All right let's begin with A2. Madam Clerk would you read that item into the record?

Chair Hart and members of the board, administrative item number two is sponsored by Supervisor Adam. It is to adopt a resolution of accommodation honoring District Attorney Investigator Commander Christopher Clement upon his retirement from the district attorney's office after over 30 years of faithful and distinguished service to the citizens of Santa Barbara County.

Supervisor Adam?

Well, I'm not going to read this entire resolution into the record. But I just want to say that it's not often that one of your favorite neighbors retires and friends. And I just want to take the opportunity to congratulate him and his wife Deanna and wish them all the best in the future.

Thank you Supervisor Adam. Next item is Item A3. Madam Clerk, would you read that item into the record?

Chair Hart and members of the Board, Administrative Item Number 3 is also sponsored by Supervisor Adam. It is to adopt a Resolution of Accommodation honoring Stuart Johnston in appreciation for his service to Santa Barbara County.

Supervisor Adam?

Thank you, on this one I got to read. Whereas Stuart Johnson dutifully served the United States Department of State while stationed in Washington DC, Beirut Lebanon and Guatemala before returning to Santa Maria to continue the work of his father at Stewart Johnson Pumps. He then completed his legal education at the Santa Barbara College of Law, and subsequently passed the State Bar of California.

And whereas Stewart Johnson has been a staunch advocate for the law throughout his career, he served as a lead litigator representative and continues to serve. As lead litigator representing the landowner group, Water Rights in Santa Maria Groundwater Basin. This group continues to represent over 10,000 acres of premier agricultural land and whereas Stewart Johnson served as a legal analyst expert and legal analysis expert assistant mentor for eight years with his unindicted co-conspirator Supervisor Peter Adam.

He worked diligently as a watchdog over process, procedure, common sense and the rule of law for the fourth district in Santa Barbara County at large. And whereas Stewart Johnson drafted Measure M, a ballot initiative that was designed to bring greater attention to the county's deferred maintenance responsibilities which Supervisor Adam shamelessly stole and claimed as his own.

And whereas, Stewart Johnson is a seasoned traveler and notorious isolationist from modern media and entertainment. His tenacious advocacy for reality and the truth have been a cornerstone in the fourth district's offices candor and policy decisions. And now, therefore be it and it is hereby ordered and resolved that this Board of Supervisors commend Stewart for his faithful and distinguished service to the citizens of Santa Barbara County. Congratulates him upon his long delayed retirement and wishes him, his wife of 54 years Jean who is the brains of the outfit, his children and grandchildren continued good health.

And many years of happiness passed and adopted by the Board of Supervisors of Santa Barbara County, State of California this 15th day of December 2020. By unanimous vote I hope of all members present. Thank you, Stewart. Yeah, Stewart, when I won, Stewart and I were talking and he was just retiring from the pump business. And I told him he'd probably just die if he put on a powder blue jumpsuit.

So I said, you better come and help me, and he did. And he stayed with me the whole time, and I appreciate him more than I can convey.

Thank you Supervisor Adam. That's a wonderful tribute to a tremendous person and what a life he has lived and will live, and thank him. Thank you Mr. Johnson for your service to the County of Santa Barbara and for your good humor and friendship. Any other comments from board members? All right let's go on then to number A10

Chair Hart and members of the Board, Administrative Item Number 10 is from Community Services. It is to consider recommendations regarding the Action Plan Substantial Amendment and the execution of agreement with United Way of Santa Barbara County, United Way, to implement an Emergency Rental Assistance Program utilizing Community Development Block Grant Coronavirus CDBG-CV funds.

Supervisor Williams. Well, I just wanted to make sure that people knew that this program was out there still in a different form. That we are committed to trying to help people through rental assistance. I think there's at least $1 million left in this it is the people will be able to apply And it's eligible folks are if they live in the unincorporated areas.

Carpentry Guadalupe and and solving so it is tremendously important because we know that there's a lot of people in real dire need And we want them to take advantage of this, to try to settle things with their landlords so that they don't have long months worth of wrangling that could affect their ability to get future housing. Thank you Supervisor Williams.

The clerk needs to read another portion of item A41 into the record.

Yes, Chair Hart and members of the Board. Thank you in regards to Administrative Item 841 from Community Services that was added to our agenda with the addendum that was posted on Friday. This was to consider recommendations regarding the execution of a grant agreement with the Housing Authority of the City of Santa Barbara for acquisition of the property located at 536 West Pedro Bosa Street in the city of Santa Barbara First District And there is a for fist vote required on this item. In addition to the changes to recommendation D, I also did want to note for the board and the public that we did receive a memo from the department yesterday revising attachment one with an explanation of what was changed as well. And this is also posted online.

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Clerk. Can we get a motion to approve the administrative agenda? Mr. Ghazani do you have something you want to add on

that? Chair Hart and just since we've talked about 841 a few times I want to make clear that both with the addendum and with the revision that still has County Council concurrence and we looked at it hard it was a fast moving item but we looked at it and the board can defensively approve that.

Thank you very much. Can we get a motion to approve the administrative agenda with as revised by the changes right into the record by the clerk? So moved.

Second.

Motion's been made and seconded, any discussion? Adam Clerk would you please call the roll?

Ms. Hartman? Aye. Mr. Adams?

Aye.

Mr Lavinino? Aye! Mr Williams? Aye And Chair Hart?

Aye

Motion passes unanimously.

Thank you We'll be taking up item A39 later in today. Now is the time for members of the public to speak on items that are not on the agenda. Madam Clerk, are there any requests to speak on items that are not on today's agenda?

Chair Hart and Members of the Board, yes we have three requests to speak on general public comment this morning. We're going to begin with Leslie Weinstock to be followed by Anne O'Deal Thomas.

Hi, I'm Leslie Weinstock. Safe Technology for Santa Barbara County is a volunteer citizen watchdog group that advocates for protective measures for wireless communication. Our main message is your hands are not tied and you have more local control than you think. The densification of cellular facilities are spreading into our residential neighborhoods and more people are developing symptoms Specific to radiofrequency exposure.

Many scientific studies show harmful bio effects to plants, animals, insects and humans. As you know we have been requesting that you reverse the December 2019 cross out in the telecom code and restore the protections we had before. Are you hearing an echo? No, we are not.

It's a little faint but we can hear you

well, Leslie. We're now left with an ordinance that deregulates the telecom industry and allows wireless facilities to be constructed anywhere. There is no independent field testing or monitoring for the radiative power. There is no verification that these facilities are operating at minimum power That provides cell phone coverage. Today, I urge you to require more transparency from SoCalGas before voting on the ordinance to install the data collection units, DCUs for the advanced meters. Before you vote on this SoCal Gas ordinance please first require them to post detailed maps addresses or exact locations of the 66 DCUs Specifications, advanced meter power density in microwatts per meter squared and the distance the radio frequencies travel.

Require them also to provide timely and effective notification before installing them. Thank you.

Thank you Ms. Weinstock.

We will now go to Anne Odile Thomas to be followed by Ren Strong.

Good morning. I am a member of Safe Technology for Santa Barbara County. Last year, the county telecom code was amended removing restrictions and protections. This gave carte blanche to wireless companies to install small cell antennas and cell towers in residential neighborhoods. Consequently we are seeing a densification of installations in our neighborhood many located within a few feet of our homes The current county code does not provide adequate protection for residents.

Additionally, we see companies such as SoCalGas adding a new ordinance for more wireless equipment using our current telecom code as the backbone. The result will be further densification of wireless equipment throughout the county. Last week I heard the board discuss the location of SoCalGas equipment next to hiking trails Discussing the location of wireless equipment next to residences is equally as important, if not more crucial. This is very important to me and many residents I have communicated with. Please require more transparency including exact locations of DCUs, power density of DCUs and advanced meters, as well as effective notification to residents before you vote.

Which company will be next and benefit from our county code that favors industry over people and the environment? I urge the Board of Supervisors to halt plans to further amend the County Telecommunication Code to benefit for-profit companies. Instead, I urge you to reconsider your decision on whether or not you would like to work

Yes. Hi, good day to everyone. This is Ren Strong or my name is Rennie Dean strong also this is regarding again the woman that spoke just recently about the 5G This millimeter microwave radiation technology is not being talked about and the effects between that and the Wi-Fi in our homes, in the hospitals. That this is weaponry. Also you have geoengineered skies.

In 2005 Santa Barbara County pushed the cloud seeding But they never talk to the media because they are in cahoots with you, the politicians, to make sure that they give disinformation which the agency is called Operation Mockingbird. Look it up. It's a CIA clandestine paid operative just like the representatives that you have there standing before you that we're listening to day in and day out during the week every week Tuesday nine o'clock but so This is also about GMO frankenfood making sure people are sick in your gut biome. And if you study what soil biology is about, then you understand why we have people having sicknesses and then they have a thing called Corona or COVID stated next to it. And I will be speaking regarding that when you come around that agenda too.

So nobody wants to speak about these things, but there's still you know glyphosate roundup being sprayed on the wheat and then they cut it and then they package it and they put it on nice and pretty on the shelves for you to ingest. So this is a sickness sick system CYST. And so yeah we need to be breaking through we need to be speaking up with me beholding These supposed representatives that it's not about safety. It's about control and it's about keep people safe, keep people conforming and yeah we need to again the law enforcement the National Guard is not to be distributing this vaccine. This is very dangerous if they can't have a flu vaccine for or a flu vaccine for you and give you flu shots and keep you from getting the flu and all this been The short amount of time for this big of a thing is more than what you're being told.

And we cannot continue to stay in cognitive dissonance regarding it. So I hope you hear me loud and clear, constituents and those...

Thank you Mr. Strong. Your time is up. Thank you very much.

We will now go to Renee O'Neill to be followed by Lynn Carlisle Requested to speak late.

Good morning, Honorable Chair Hart and Supervisors. Can you hear me?

Yes we can Miss O'Neill please go

ahead. Thank you. This is Renee O'Neill. As the year 2020 ends, I wish to take this opportunity to recognize and thank the board and other agencies in our county for their incredibly hard work during this unprecedented year. I can't imagine how challenging 2020 must have been and continues to be for all of you. Let's hope 2021 presents a much brighter and safer future On behalf of Tepeskay, I would like to express my deepest appreciation to the board for supporting the EDRN community's efforts to help protect our residents' public health, safety and welfare from undesirable commercial industries.

I want to thank all the folks within the various county departments and agencies that do their best to oversee the various aspects of running this county I wish I had time to list each of your names and describe how you have been specifically helpful to me. Most of you know who you are. In lieu of that, let me thank our county CEOs, our sheriff's enforcement team, members of the planning department, clerks of the board, and all the other folks that help run this community smoothly—our county smoothly.

Supervisor Adam, I want to thank you and let you know how much I will miss you. Your witty comments and the balance your voice added to the board these past eight years. We may not have always agreed with each other on some issues but I have always admired and respected you for your dedication to this county. You will be sorely missed and I hope your replacement You can fill even one quarter of your shoes.

So I will miss you so much Peter. I also understand that Barney is making Barney Melechian is making a change and I want to thank Barney for his many years of service in his profession, and especially the last few years in this county. Barney, I will miss you and wish you the very best in your newest endeavor to serve the county of Santa Barbara, hopefully as interim police chief for Santa Barbara City.

That's about all I have to say. Just want to thank all of you and wish you a very happy holiday and a very excellent new year. Take care all. See ya later.

Thank you Ms. O'Neill. That concludes public comment. Thank you for those who commented

Chair Hart and members of the board, my apologies. We did have one late request from Lynn Carlisle who is our final speaker.

Thank you. It's Miss Garlow. Go ahead, please.

Good morning, Chair Hart and supervisors. My name is Lynn Carlisle. I'm the executive director of the Koyama Valley Family Resource Center. Can you hear me?

Yes, we can. Thank you.

Wonderful. Thank you. Um, I am here representing a group of people in Santa Barbara County who've been serving isolated seniors during this pandemic And we are very concerned about the future of our ability to serve those seniors. We have received some federal dollars, but that has been at risk and we're not sure what the future of that is. Many of our services are having to end at the end of December.

We have in Cuyama been serving regularly. We were serving over almost 90 seniors With five cooked meals that are delivered to their homes, as well as groceries, bagged food. And we are concerned about the future of being able to serve those folks once the funding runs out. I know that some of my colleagues were going to speak this morning but so I am not as prepared as I'm sure they were.

But I can speak to Cuyama that we have now provided more than 12,000 meals To our seniors. And given where we are, we're very concerned about how we're going to continue funding and serving the very vulnerable elderly community. I think that this community is kind of hidden in the COVID situation because they're usually not out there asking for funding and help.

So we've been doing our best to service folks and make sure they get what they need So I would hope that the board and the county in deliberating about if you have funding to distribute, and if you can support our seniors going forward that you consider doing so. Thank you so much for your time.

Thank you Ms. Carlisle. And thank you for your work helping people at this time of need.

Chair Hart and members of the board, departmental item number one is from the county executive office. It is a hearing to consider recommendations regarding a coronavirus disease 2019 COVID-19 update.

Welcome Dr. DeRionne Pollard.

Good morning chair and members of the board. Today's briefing topics will include our local COVID-19 data, anticipated numbers for the blueprint for a safer economy as well as a brief vaccine update And Assistant CEO Nancy Anderson will be providing the RISE business update. Also with me today virtually via Zoom is Dr. Henning Ansorg, our Health Officer. As you can see from this graph, from November 30th to December 14th we have an accumulative case count of 13,557. This denotes a 17% increase during a two-week period.

Our current status from November 30th again to December 14, we have a 129% increase in the number of active cases going from 410 to now 940. We have a 127% increase in the number of hospitalizations, going from 33 to 75. And we have currently a cumulative death of 140. The seven-day rolling sum of new cases by areas. Over the past two weeks, seeing an increase in all areas of our county.

Noteworthy it ranges anywhere from 11% all the way to 76% in Santa Maria. As you may have noted yesterday, Santa Barbara County reported the highest daily case count of COVID-19 with 360 positive cases. This surge in cases falls just over two weeks after the Thanksgiving holiday and it is directly related to the gatherings of family and friends as we had predicted.

As I mentioned earlier, the number of hospitalization cases increased by 127%, going from 33 to 75 cases. Our ICU cases increase 200% going from 7 to 21 cases. With regards to the occupation types of our COVID-19 cases, the data in front of you is occupation type from week 48. This is because about half of the cases from week 49 had not been interviewed by the time of this data analysis.

So we see that clerical management comprises a larger percent of cases still in week 48 at 23.4% compared to the overall percentage during the pandemic, which is 13.2%. The retired group is higher in week 48 at 22.8%, compared to the pandemic level at 16.7%. As we have seen in previous weeks, the percent of cases that are ag workers At 2.3% is much lower than the overall percentage during the pandemic, which was 17.7%.

Again this is the occupation as reported by our cases not necessarily the point or the place of exposure or infection. With regards to blueprint for a safer economy We anticipate that for today, the numbers will be released shortly with Santa Barbara County at 19.2 adjusted case rate for tier assignment and that was adjusted downwards from 24.4 The state median for tests continues for the next three weeks at 362.39% and during this rating period we average at 518.9%.

This is the rainbow graph to trend our case rate, and as you can see the curve we are experiencing a steep rise in case rate from 14.4 to 19.2 in one rating period which is equivalent to about a 33% increase. Our testing positivity also is increasing, going from 4.6 to this week's 6.1 and that denotes a 36% increase. Our health equity metric went from 6.2 to now 8.3, denoting an increase of 34%.

Anticipated ICU availability, Northern California at 29.8%, the Bay Area at 15.8%. Greater Sacramento at 14.9%. The San Joaquin Valley at 1.6% and Southern California at 1 .7%. This is a comparison of our regional adult ICU bed availability. As you can see, the rest line is the trend for Southern California region whereas the blue line reflects the Central Coast and we started this calculation last week when Petition the state for San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara County and Ventura County to be considered as a separate region for exiting the regional stay at home order.

Currently we have. 30 Santa Barbara County under the stay at home order ICU capacity calculation, we stand at 38.4% with slow at 47.9%, and Ventura at 1.4%. So collectively for December 14th that number would be 30% as compared to the 2.7% for the whole region. Our brief vaccine update, we anticipate the delivery of 3,900 Pfizer doses within the next few days and two boxes will be directly delivered to Cottage Hospital with two boxes to Marion Regional Medical Centers. And we anticipate the delivery of 6,600 Moderna doses as early as next week pending FDA Emergency use authorization approval.

And in addition to that, we were notified early this morning that we will be getting additional shipments of Pfizer to be delivered two cases to be delivered sometime next week with regards to vaccine and the.

What was that again on? How many is that that in numbers

So that would be an additional 2,925 anticipated delivery December 22nd through the 23rd. With regards to the vaccination prioritization it will be going to our hospital healthcare workers as well as other health workers in the community That is at high risk. We are awaiting for additional guidance from CDPH on the prioritization of essential workers for the following phase and that concludes my public health update.

Thank you, Doctor Duranosa. Are there questions for Dr. Duranosa? Supervisor Williams I know you've given us this stat but how many Healthcare workers are in sort of the first level of prioritization. Obviously that 11,000 or 12,000 doses has to be halved because it needs two dose per individual my understanding is right?

Right. So with the initial 3,900 it will go to the area hospitals and our health care workers in skilled nursing facilities and other long-term care facilities will be served directly by the pharmacies.

And so give me a sense of the numbers that this first batch Take care of that. Those those working sectors or a portion of that working sector, a

small portion of that sector and we anticipate though following this initial 3900. We will be getting the Moderna the following week and the second shipment of Pfizer so we anticipate additional allocations to be arriving fairly rapidly

And so how much of those sectors will we cover this month?

We know basically from day to day about the allocation. So all that we have confirmed initially is the 3,900 Pfizer for the first dose for the first shipment, the 6,600 for the Moderna and the additional 2,925 as a third allocation. So we don't have information about the fourth, fifth and so on.

I believe there's about 20,000 frontline medical workers in Santa Barbara County. And so this is about two-thirds of that and I don't believe that this first batch of vaccine is going to be reserved for the second application for individuals. All of these vaccines will be given to people now and the second dose will come with a future shipment.

Thank

you. Are there other questions for Dr. Dorenoso? Supervisor Adams?

Yes. Yeah, Dr. Dorenoso could you go through the false positive information that you sent me? I had a request from a constituent about the magnitude of false positives and you responded maybe you can go through that please.

Sure. Supervisor Adam, through the chair. So the question is what is the false positive rate on PCR COVID tests? Our research, our review of literature shows that the most common range for false positives in PCR tests for SARS-CoV-2 ranges from .8 to 4%, which with the extreme low of 0% to a rare extreme high of 16.7%. So false positives can be a result of different PCR tests which have different types of sensitivities.

It is also further influenced and determined by the prevalence of disease in the community, what type of swabs are used and how quickly the test is run after collection And by the lab processing. And yes, PCR currently is the most common testing and it's considered to be the best that we currently have. And I don't know if Dr. Ansorg is on the Zoom but he may have additional input.

Yeah, thank you. Dr. Dorian also false positive tests are very much dependent on the platform that's been used. And it is actually a rare occurrence. So, in an area like us where we have less than 10% positivity rate now we have 6%. A month ago we had 3%, the false positives are really negligible and With respect to the public health, we rather have a false positive than a false negative false negatives are actually a bigger problem and false positives because we could miss.

Patients who have minor symptoms or no symptoms and still be contagious. So we are much more worried about that. If your constituent was wondering if our numbers are exaggerated because of a high level of false positives, that is not the case however.

Well, it probably could be if we had a event that included an extreme high of 16.7%. That's pretty significant wouldn't you agree?

No well no I wouldn't because that number is not really peer-reviewed article at all and it's not reliable So for all intents and purposes, we have to go with the zero to 4%. Okay. Which is a very reasonable result even if you do a normal blood test on a blood count or hemoglobin or something, you have this amount of variability always in any test.

Okay, got a couple of follow-ups. One is how does the prevalence of disease in the community work to have a higher rate of false positives? Because you'd think I would think that if you had a testing regime testing mechanism like this the nasal swabs and you were testing Even in a controlled situation, to do an actual false positive or false negative screen on those mechanical tests that you would test 100% known And then see how many false positives you got, right? I mean that's the protocol for testing for efficacy is it not.

No, I don't think so.

I'm talking about the clinical testing of the testing method not necessarily testing the population at large. I am talking about just qualification of the mechanical means of testing themselves Just to establish the fact that it's a valid protocol.

Well, that depends on the platform and the platform has to be validated against the platform from the CDC. And it totally depends on the various platforms. That's a very lab technical question that I'm not equipped to answer. I would have to defer to Dr. Comer our Lab Director for that question.

Okay,

well, and as public health officers we have to rely on the current lab technology.

Okay, well I just can't stand it when there's statements sprinkled in like the prevalence of disease in the community has an effect on the false positive rate because that just seems like it shouldn't work that way. And if it works that way, I'm questioning why?

Well, okay. I understand your concern now. Let me give you the opposite example if you have a population like us where we have less than 10% positivity rate so most people who get tested are negative In that scenario, if you and I were going to a test center and got our swab done, the likelihood of you and me without symptoms being negative is extremely high. Right?

So when that's the case, when the majority of tests like more than around 94% come back as negatives, the likelihood of picking up false negatives is quite high just It just by the magnitude of the two negative people. So, the prevalence on the false positives does not go up. Why are you laughing sir? What is so funny about that?

Well it just seems to me that if you have a test that works It works and it should work the same. Yes, it does work really well in a controlled situation. Excuse me doctor I don't know why you need to jump on me like this just relax. I don' t like to

be ridiculed sir

I am not ridiculing you. I'm just processing the information and, you know, I'm a human being and I have reactions I can't control like everybody else. And so if I find something that doesn't make sense to me then sometimes people laugh and I just did that and I wasn't trying to ridicule you. Okay, and if that's the information you're getting I'm just asking a question.

And if you don't want to answer it, you can not answer it then.

I am happy to answer your question but I thought I made it clear that if you have 94 people who are likely negative and you test 100 of them You are more likely to pick up some false negatives than if you have the likelihood of 95% of them to be positive, then the chances of your negative test is different. So how many people likely have the disease in a tested population is very important to decide on the chances of this test to be accurately Negative or positive, that's all I'm trying to say. So it is a very important factor what kind of population you're testing?

Okay well I'm just going to have to accept that thank you.

You're welcome. All right there are the questions for Dr. Duranosa and Dr. Answorth. All right Miss Anderson continue with the presentation. Actually I do have a question from the The lag time is typically two weeks between new cases and the ICU glut?

Two to three weeks.

Ms. Anderson.

Good morning, Mr. Chairman and members of the board. We wanted to provide a brief update regarding RISE business activity and Expand upon some of the business resources that we touched on last week. As of last Friday, we're about 4441 businesses that have submitted through our reopening program countywide. Our top three sectors include retail stores, restaurants and office workspaces.

We touched on this last week, these are listing out the state website links for businesses. These are the main four that us county folks use to get the daily information and changes. associated to the blueprint for Safer Economy. This includes the new regional stay-at-home order, the essential workforce now that we're having to refresh ourselves on because of the regional stay at home order, the blueprint for a safer economy website that identifies exactly by sector in each county what the restrictions are And the final is the business and employers resource page, and we'll touch about that a little bit further.

So the state financial assistance information has been revamped on their website and they're looking at other alternatives to provide more information to small businesses obviously because of the length of this pandemic and the impact on the small businesses this has been a major concern So for the state website they've added the Small Business Hiring Tax Credit, interest-free deferral of sales and tax use tax, the California Rebuilding Fund for small business loans, the Small Business Disaster Relief Loan Guarantee Program and Small Business Loan Guarantee Program via iBank.

And small business debt relief. These actually drill down even further on their website, it's actually fairly robust and walks businesses through those processes. In addition, Supervisor Hartman asked last week if we could address some of the local resources. On our RecoverySBC.org website this is the typical go-to for many businesses are reopening and rise guide page Right below that on the same page we have our local health orders and our resources for businesses and resources for individuals. We do need to revamp this as well when we initially posted most of this activity it was funding that was available through CARES Act, most CARES Act funding now Is has been expended or grants that are initially addressed out in the community were have been expended as of the end of November.

So we're looking at this and you'll see some changes, but we did want to bring that to businesses attention that's there, but we have more work to do on it just to let the public know we do have local resources though for businesses. These are just a snapshot of just a few that we were able to identify and we validated Are still continuing and trying to assist businesses throughout our community. And here's some more detail I'd like to start with the County of Santa Barbara's Workforce Development Board They've been a partner with us in the rise activity and really helping on the employer employee assistance side there's been funding dedicated to the workforce development board in order to help laid-off workers or Help identify positions that are open throughout the community.

So it's a good resource for those seeking employment For or for businesses that have opportunity for those seeking employment, so it's a good resource and here is the website linked to that Additionally, the first two I identified here, the Economic Development Collaborative and Service Corps of Retired Executives or SCORE are two resources where businesses can actually get mentorship and help look at where they're at.

And perhaps online resources that are available to their situation depending on their size and the issues that they're working with. We also have the Small Business Development Center Disaster Preparedness Toolkit. A lot of connected resources there is a PDF document that was developed by the Small Business Development Center and is very useful in walking through a business on what they should be focusing on. United Way has been a good partner for the county and other agencies throughout the community, and quite frankly throughout the state so they have some Employee related financial hardship assistance. The Women's Economic Ventures or WEAVE has been very successful in our community and helping small businesses find financial assistance through loans, and those are still going.

We have the Santa Barbara Foundation they've issued over 19 million dollars in Grants or other resources that including a portion of what your Board of Supervisors? Contributed to one of those current programs and many of the cities have done as well most of that funding has Been used, but there is some more and we're focused. They're looking at Regrouping and then putting on another round of funding for small businesses.

And our two partners that have been really beneficial to us on the RISE side in a true partnership is the Santa Barbara South Coast Chamber of Commerce and Santa Maria Chamber of Commerce, always a good resource for businesses local to reach out to these folks they have connections they can assist and they've been really instrumental And getting out RISE business changes throughout their network and membership.

And again, we always continue to have our RecoverySBC.org updated. If businesses have operational questions due to state changes, our EHS staff are standing by and really phenomenal in getting back to the mass quantity of questions that we get. They're at ehsadminatSBCPhD.org. Our RISE ambassadors Moving throughout the community, assisting us on our website updates and translating for our Spanish guide. It takes a rise guide in any change we make produces in Spanish.

So have been really instrumental in helping us keep going on that. And of course we continue to have our SBC PEP right-of-way and private property encroachment needs addressed through our public works and public planning, I'm sorry our planning department in order to assist those departments. And that includes my comments. I'm happy to answer any questions you may have.